Head of Security Engineering

The Head of Security Engineering is responsible for leading the Security Engineering function and establishing the technical capabilities, platforms, automation and engineering practices required to protect the organisation at scale.

The role combines technical leadership, people leadership and hands-on security engineering, providing direction to Security Engineers while partnering closely with Software Engineering, Platform Engineering, IT, Security Operations, SGRC and other technology teams.

The Security Engineering function has a defined mission to design, build and automate security capabilities that protect technology platforms at scale, with strategic objectives covering security-by-design, automation, technical guardrails, secure software delivery and cloud security maturity.

The successful candidate will be an experienced security engineering leader who can translate security requirements into pragmatic, reusable engineering solutions and help move security from manual processes and point solutions towards centralised platforms, automation, policy-driven controls and secure-by-default engineering patterns.

About Product & Technology

Product & Technology plays a pivotal role in aligning the organization with its strategic objectives and enhancing shareholder value. Product & Technology is responsible for establishing unified standards and governance practices throughout the company. Additionally, we oversee the development and maintenance of core applications essential for the seamless operation of various functions across the organization. We are committed to driving and executing future roadmaps that are in line with the overall strategic direction of RWS. 

With a global reach, Product & Technology provides support services to over 7500 end users worldwide. We take pride in managing the information security operation and safeguarding all our assets. Our core functions encompass Enterprise & Technical Architecture, Network & Voice, Infrastructure, Service Delivery, Service Operations, Data & Analytics, Security & Quality Compliance, Transformation, Application Development, Enterprise Platforms, With a dedicated team of over 500 staff, Product & Technology ensures a strong presence across all regions, enabling efficient and effective support to our global operations.

Key Responsibilities

Security Engineering Leadership

• Lead and develop the Security Engineering team, providing clear technical direction, priorities and accountability.
• Coach and mentor Security Engineers and Senior Security Engineers, building both technical depth and engineering leadership capability.
• Establish engineering principles, standards and ways of working for the Security Engineering function.
• Own and prioritise the Security Engineering backlog and ensure engineering effort is focused on the areas of greatest organisational risk and value.
• Build a culture of engineering excellence, automation, ownership, collaboration and continuous improvement.
• Remain technically engaged and provide senior-level guidance on complex security engineering challenges.

Security Architecture & Engineering

• Lead the development of reusable security architectures, patterns and technical guardrails.
• Provide technical leadership for security architecture and secure design decisions.
• Lead or support threat modelling and technical security reviews for significant platforms, products and services.
• Establish secure-by-design and secure-by-default approaches that can be consistently adopted across Product & Technology.
• Lead the Security Engineering contribution to architecture governance and design assurance.

Security Platforms

• Own the technical strategy and engineering lifecycle for strategic security platforms.
• Drive consolidation of fragmented or overlapping security technologies.
• Ensure platforms are integrated into a coherent enterprise security ecosystem.
• Establish appropriate engineering standards for deployment, configuration, integration and lifecycle management.
• Drive platform optimisation, resilience, coverage and adoption.
• Establish clear handovers and operational models with Security Operations.

Cloud Security Engineering

• Lead security engineering across AWS, Azure, SaaS and cloud-native environments.
• Establish cloud security architecture, baselines, guardrails and reusable patterns.
• Lead adoption and optimisation of CSPM and cloud workload security capabilities.
• Embed security into cloud landing zones and platform engineering practices.
• Establish scalable controls for containers, Kubernetes, serverless and modern cloud workloads.
• Partner with cloud and platform teams to resolve systemic security weaknesses rather than addressing individual findings in isolation.

DevSecOps & Secure Software Delivery

• Define and lead the Security Engineering approach to DevSecOps and secure software delivery.
• Embed automated security controls within CI/CD and engineering workflows.
• Lead adoption and optimisation of SAST, DAST, SCA, secrets scanning and related application-security capabilities.
• Establish reusable security configurations, workflows and engineering patterns.
• Partner with engineering leadership to improve secure development practices without introducing unnecessary delivery friction.
• Champion security-as-code and policy-as-code approaches.

Security Automation

• Establish an automation-first approach across Security Engineering.
• Identify high-volume manual processes that can be replaced with engineering and automation.
• Drive integration between security platforms through APIs, orchestration and event-driven workflows.
• Promote Infrastructure as Code and policy-as-code.
• Develop reusable automation capabilities that can be consumed across Security, Engineering and Platform teams.
• Measure automation effectiveness and continually identify opportunities to reduce manual effort.

Identity & Zero Trust Engineering

• Provide technical leadership for security engineering requirements relating to identity and privileged access.
• Support the development of automated identity controls and access governance integrations.
• Drive adoption of Zero Trust and identity-centric security principles.
• Partner with the relevant enterprise technology teams on PAM, Conditional Access and privileged identity improvements.
• Ensure identity controls integrate effectively with cloud, endpoint and security monitoring capabilities.

AI Security Engineering

• Establish practical technical security controls and guardrails for AI-enabled platforms and solutions.
• Partner with AI, Product, Engineering, Data and SGRC teams to translate AI security and governance requirements into technical controls.
• Support secure architecture and threat modelling for AI solutions.
• Develop reusable patterns that enable secure AI adoption rather than relying solely on manual assurance.

Technical AI security controls are explicitly assigned to Security Engineering within the current operating model, while AI governance is led through SGRC with Security Engineering responsible for technical implementation.

Security Operations Partnership

• Establish effective engineering-to-operations handovers for new security capabilities.
• Partner with Security Operations to improve monitoring, detection and response capabilities.
• Provide engineering expertise during complex security incidents where required.
• Ensure lessons identified through incidents are translated into sustainable technical improvements.
• Partner on vulnerability prioritisation and remediation, focusing particularly on systemic and repeatable engineering solutions.

Stakeholder & Cross-Functional Leadership

• Build strong relationships with Software Engineering, Platform Engineering, Enterprise Architecture, IT, Product, Data & AI, Security Operations and SGRC.
• Translate complex security challenges into pragmatic technical solutions.
• Influence engineering roadmaps and architecture decisions.
• Represent Security Engineering within technical and architecture governance forums.
• Communicate technical risks, priorities and investment requirements clearly to senior technology and security leadership.

Skills & Experience

Essential

• Significant experience in Security Engineering, Cloud Security, Platform Engineering, DevSecOps or related engineering disciplines.
• Proven experience leading engineers or providing technical leadership across complex engineering environments.
• Deep understanding of security architecture and security control design.
• Strong experience securing AWS and/or Azure environments.
• Strong understanding of cloud-native architecture, containers and modern infrastructure.
• Proven experience integrating security into CI/CD and software engineering workflows.
• Strong understanding of vulnerability management and threat modelling.
• Experience building security automation using Python, PowerShell or similar, REST APIs and orchestration technologies.
• Strong Infrastructure as Code experience using technologies such as Terraform or CloudFormation.
• Experience with identity security, privileged access and Zero Trust principles.
• Experience implementing and operating enterprise security technologies.
• Strong stakeholder management skills and the ability to influence engineering teams without relying solely on authority.
• Demonstrable ability to turn security requirements into practical engineering solutions.

Desirable

• Experience with technologies such as Wiz, Microsoft Defender, Microsoft Sentinel, GitHub Advanced Security or equivalent enterprise security platforms.
• Experience establishing policy-as-code or automated security guardrails.
• Experience securing Kubernetes, containers and serverless environments.
• Experience designing security controls for AI-enabled applications or platforms.
• Experience working in complex, global technology environments.
• Experience supporting significant security transformation or tooling consolidation programmes.
• Familiarity with security requirements arising from ISO 27001 and SOC 2 environments.

Why This Role Matters

RWS is moving towards a security model where controls are increasingly embedded, automated and continuously measured, replacing fragmented and heavily manual approaches.

The Security Engineering Lead will be central to making that transition successful.

The role will provide leadership across security architecture, cloud security, DevSecOps, identity engineering, security automation, AI security and security platforms, all of which sit within the defined Security Engineering capability.

Rather than security operating primarily as a gatekeeper, this role will help create paved roads, reusable patterns, automated guardrails and self-service capabilities that allow engineering teams to deliver securely and quickly.

Our purpose is to unlock global understanding. This means our work fundamentally recognizes the value of every language and culture. So, we celebrate difference, we are inclusive and believe that diversity makes us strong. We want every employee to grow as an individual and excel in their career. 

In return, we expect all our people to live by the values that unite us: to partner, putting clients fist and winning together, to pioneer, innovating fearlessly and leading with vision and courage, to progress, aiming high and growing through actions and to deliver, owning the outcome and building trust with our colleagues and clients.

RWS embraces DEI and promotes equal opportunity, we are an Equal Opportunity Employer and prohibit discrimination and harassment of any kind. RWS is committed to the principle of equal employment opportunity for all employees and to providing employees with a work environment free of discrimination and harassment. All employment decisions at RWS are based on business needs, job requirements and individual qualifications, without regard to race, religion, nationality, ethnicity, sex, age, disability, or sexual orientation. RWS will not tolerate discrimination based on any of these characteristics. 

RWS Values 

Get the 3Ps right – Partner, Pioneer, Progress – and we´ll Deliver together as RWS.

Recruitment Agencies: RWS Holdings PLC does not accept agency resumes.  Please do not forward any unsolicited resumes to any RWS employees.  Any unsolicited resume received will be treated as the property of RWS and Terms & Conditions associated with the use of such resume will be considered null and void.

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